World News - Senior Iraqi Election Official Says Final Results Unlikely to Be Released Next Week

Iraq's electoral commission won't release final results from last month's election in coming days because the panel is waiting on international monitors to finish investigating fraud complaints, a senior Iraqi election official said Saturday. "It is impossible to have the final election results this week," Safwat Rashid, a senior member of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq told The Associated Press. He was referring to the Islamic week, which began Friday and ends on Thursday. A senior official with an international team assessing the results at the request of the IEIC said the group won't issue its own findings for at least another week.... http://abcnews.go.com

The Hejaz Railway was built 100 years ago to carry pilgrims from Istanbul to Medina but was blown up by Lawrence of Arabia during World War I. Stretches of the line are still used today by passenger and goods trains with engines and carriages from another era. My first encounter with the Hejaz Railway was in clouds of steam along with a pungent smell of hot grease, at Kadem station in Damascus. A veteran steam locomotive built in 1914 chuffed past, hauling a goods train towards the Jordan border. From the driver's cab, two soot streaked faces leaned out to see the iron road ahead. It was like stepping back a century in railway history. But I had to remind myself that this was not history, this was now! The engineer in charge of the 100-year-old maintenance sheds (two huge stone buildings full of rolling stock and engines) pointed to the oldest locomotive in service, built in Germany in 1898. "Just one of 11 steam locomotives in service," he told me with obvious pride...http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/4609450.stm

Although it's illegal for legislators to accept campaign money during a regular legislative session, they can ironically accept contributions during the special session on ethics. Many legislators and good-government groups were unaware of the loophole as the high-profile session began on Tuesday with rhetoric about the need for reform. But some lobbyists and others whose job is to influence public policy were well versed in the fine print of the campaign rules. Only hours into the debate, The Tennessean has learned, special interests began offering campaign contributions to lawmakers. Representatives of several political action committees, or PACs, approached the House and Senate Republican caucus seeking to donate not long after Gov. Phil Bredesen gave his opening speech to the General Assembly. Using the word ethics with today’s crop of politicians is an oxymoron. But somehow they are always voted back in. And who is responsible, look in the mirror you will see the culprit...http://www.tennessean.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060115/NEWS0201/601150382

Pressure is mounting on the judge presiding over the trial of Saddam Hussein to reconsider his resignation from the post. In the face of criticism of his handling of the case, Rizkar Mohammed Amin, the chief judge on the Iraqi High Tribunal, handed in his notice to quit on 10 January, according to an official close to the court. Speaking anonymously, the official said: "Efforts are underway to try to get him to change his mind," adding that the resignation had not yet been accepted. While the trial has taken up only seven court days since it started on 19 October, Amin has come under pressure at home and abroad for allowing what critics see as theatrics by the defence counsels and the accused. If his resignation were accepted, Amin would be the second judge on the five-strong panel trying Saddam and seven former aides to quit since the trial began. A spokeswoman for the office of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, who is currently out of the country, confirmed that his ...http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/615CAD6E-D937-40F8-A294-AA515ADE8486.htm

MPs are calling for a fresh inquiry into a £5.6bn government contract used to 'sweeten' the controversial part-sale of defence group Qinetiq to US private equity group Carlyle.The 25-year deal to manage the Ministry of Defence's 22 practice ranges is currently the MoD's largest contract. It was awarded to Qinetiq without competition and signed off on 28 February 2003, the same day that Carlyle paid £42.3m for a 34 per cent stake in Qinetiq. Senior defence sources have described it as, in effect, a 'dowry' from taxpayers to Carlyle.Carlyle is now expected to make an eightfold return on its 34 per cent stake when 49 per cent of Qinetiq is floated next month, while executive chairman John Chisholm stands to see his £129,000 investment grow to around £23m.The deal to sell the stake to Carlyle has attracted severe criticism for being too cheap, including from former defence minister Lord Moonie, who handled it while at the MoD....http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1686478,00.html

A suspected suicide bomber has attacked a convoy of Nato soldiers in southern Afghanistan killing a Canadian official with them and two bystanders. Thirteen people - including three Canadian soldiers - were wounded in the attack near a busy bus station in the city of Kandahar. A witness told the BBC he heard a loud blast and saw soldiers and civilians lying hurt near an overturned vehicle. A man claiming to speak for the Taleban says it carried out the attack. Nato is seeking to expand its deployment from peacekeeping duties in the capital Kabul to the volatile south of the country. The south and east have been the scene of intense violence which last year left more than 1,400 dead, making it the deadliest year since 2001. Much of the violence has been blamed on remnants of the hardline Taleban movement, which governed Afghanistan until the US-led invasion four years ago. The Canadian convoy was travelling to its base when it was attacked, police told the BBC. ...http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/4614188.stm